How is it people like Steam?

[Atomic Playboy]

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo
I bought the Orange Box about a month ago, and I have yet been able to play a single game in it. You run the game, it has to update EVERY SINGLE GAME, and then it just flickers in and out of the game for a while before I have to kill every process. :|

Is this crap normal, or is it just with me? What a damn waste--and I was so hopeful as I've heard so much about this game.

You don't need to update every game. Right click on the game that's updating and click "Pause updating." Bam.

 

[KMFJD]

PBKAC

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Originally posted by: skace

Originally posted by: zerogear
I have this problem with Vista x64, but I just have to make sure that the game loading is 'focused' at the time of loading to make it load.

Oh I've seen that if I try to steal the focus away from TF2 while it's loading. The program will open and close many times until I alt tab out and back into it. Only happens if say, I double click on TF2, hit launch game, and then go try and type an email while it loads.

That sounds exactly like what is going on. I'll have to try that.

 

[thilanliyan]

If Steam helps keep PC gaming more popular...I'm all for it.

 

[zerogear]

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo

Originally posted by: skace

Originally posted by: zerogear
I have this problem with Vista x64, but I just have to make sure that the game loading is 'focused' at the time of loading to make it load.

Oh I've seen that if I try to steal the focus away from TF2 while it's loading. The program will open and close many times until I alt tab out and back into it. Only happens if say, I double click on TF2, hit launch game, and then go try and type an email while it loads.

That sounds exactly like what is going on. I'll have to try that.

It seems to be more of a quirk with the source engine. If it does happen, you don't really need to shut down every process, if its a source game (most likely it is), just close down hl2.exe.

 

[Golgatha]

Never a technical problem with Steam here. Now, the whole purchase is locked to a single account and can't be resold, and the fact that the retail version of a game is often cheaper than the Steamed version are my main gripes.

 

[videogames101]

Uh, I've only ever had 1 problem, and that was easily fixed on my end... I love steam.

See sig...

 

[zerogear]

Originally posted by: videogames101
Uh, I've only ever had 1 problem, and that was easily fixed on my end... I love steam.

See sig...

Steam ate up my bandwidth, so I'm hitting 250GB of my bandwidth cap from comcast. Not that I care.

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

Originally posted by: zerogear

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo

Originally posted by: skace

Originally posted by: zerogear
I have this problem with Vista x64, but I just have to make sure that the game loading is 'focused' at the time of loading to make it load.

Oh I've seen that if I try to steal the focus away from TF2 while it's loading. The program will open and close many times until I alt tab out and back into it. Only happens if say, I double click on TF2, hit launch game, and then go try and type an email while it loads.

That sounds exactly like what is going on. I'll have to try that.

It seems to be more of a quirk with the source engine. If it does happen, you don't really need to shut down every process, if its a source game (most likely it is), just close down hl2.exe.

Half Life 2 works. Portal just isn't working correctly. It constantly alt-tabs between the desktop and the game, and the game never comes up. I'll keep messing with it to try to get it to work, as I would like to try this game. Half Life 2 seems interesting so far, so it wasn't a complete loss.

 

[videogames101]

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo

Originally posted by: zerogear

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo

Originally posted by: skace

Originally posted by: zerogear
I have this problem with Vista x64, but I just have to make sure that the game loading is 'focused' at the time of loading to make it load.

Oh I've seen that if I try to steal the focus away from TF2 while it's loading. The program will open and close many times until I alt tab out and back into it. Only happens if say, I double click on TF2, hit launch game, and then go try and type an email while it loads.

That sounds exactly like what is going on. I'll have to try that.

It seems to be more of a quirk with the source engine. If it does happen, you don't really need to shut down every process, if its a source game (most likely it is), just close down hl2.exe.

Half Life 2 works. Portal just isn't working correctly. It constantly alt-tabs between the desktop and the game, and the game never comes up. I'll keep messing with it to try to get it to work, as I would like to try this game. Half Life 2 seems interesting so far, so it wasn't a complete loss.

Interesting? It's the top-rated PC game ever.

 

[irishScott]

Originally posted by: Molondo
Midnight Run 2, Manhunt, Return to castle woflenstein all don't work for me, and bunch of other people, unless you mess around with the OS's Data protection or whatever. Sometimes problems like these really makes steam look like a cash cow. I don't think they even test games they put up for sale.

They integrated DOSBOX into their release of the X-Com series very well. That definitely requires testing. There's a slight audio delay, but that's due to the emulator, not steam. Not much you can do about that in many cases.

It's not without it's occasional issues, but no system is perfect. My only beef is that some games (CoH) require you to be online ingame to even play the single player. Granted, if I'm not online I'm probably too busy to play serious games anyway, but it pisses me off to have paid full price for a slightly crippled game without telling me about it.

 

[PepePeru]

i like steam alright.
they have some godly servers / bandwidth.

i've not had any major issues and like others that have posted, i love not having to keep up w/ discs etc.

I just reinstalled windows, its nice to set up a few big downloads (HL2, TF2, portal...etc) hit the sack and wake up the next morning w/ them all installed.

 

[Aikouka]

Steam has always worked fine for me.

 

[Newbian]

Originally posted by: rudder
Steam is a mixed bag for me. I have never had any major technical issues with it except getting kicked occasionaly for invalid steam ID. Also when I moved and first turned on my PC (no internet available yet) I could not play any games even in offline mode... that sucked.

There is a way to play the games while not online but it was a pain the last time I looked into it.

Otherwise the only problem is when they first release a game and they get flooded to the point where you can't actually download the game for a few days for those that download them other then buying physical copies.

 

[TestedAcorn]

In Vista if you try to click past the VALVE logo it'll flicker like you're saying. The escape key doesn't cause problems with skipping that intro valve video though. If this isn't your problem IDK what is. I've always been fine with steam.

 

[Auryg]

I love love loveeee being able to format and then having it reinstall all of those games for me by itself over the internets.

 

[ViviTheMage]

I love steam, it is a godsend, SRSLY....all games NEED to be on it.

 

[flashbacck]

I've never had a problem playing games through steam. My only beef with steam is that it takes forever to startup and load.

 

[DangerAardvark]

Originally posted by: Crusty
The source engine has tons of problems with alt-tab. To get around that I run all my MP games in windowed mode and just go fullscreen whenever I'm in a single player game, this helps so much with more then 1 monitor.

I've had problems with that too, but I find if I shift-tab (or is it ctrl-tab?) into the steam overlay first, then I can alt-tab without a problem.

 

[Eeezee]

I like Steam because it's a digital backup of my games. I don't need to worry about a lost or broken disc. I haven't run into any problems so far.

I wish they'd allow me to activate Bioshock on Steam, but it's not one of the games on their fancy list (I have a box copy)

You should definitely go back and try to get the Orange Box to work. They have customer support, they may be able to help you.

 

[Maximilian]

Originally posted by: Fullmetal Chocobo
I bought the Orange Box about a month ago, and I have yet been able to play a single game in it. You run the game, it has to update EVERY SINGLE GAME, and then it just flickers in and out of the game for a while before I have to kill every process. :|

Is this crap normal, or is it just with me? What a damn waste--and I was so hopeful as I've heard so much about this game.

Well i dont "love steam" as some people seem to but it beats the crap out of the alternatives, plus valve is a trustworthy company so if they were ever to go under im sure they would tie up steams loose ends so we dont lose all our games.

Gripes i have with it is you cant change your steam account name at all, or transfer a game from 1 steam account to another. Even contacting support you cant do these things.

 

[quadomatic]

I ABSOLUTELY LOVE STEAM! I hate having to deal with discs (lost my Bioshock disc recently). Also, if it weren't for steam, there's a decent chance that Valve would have some sort of stupid DRM that ruins everything. Steam is just SOOOO convenient.

I too wish every game were on Steam. NOW, only if all the people who released games on Steam realized that there is no reason to leave SecuROM protection on the games.

 

[nismotigerwvu]

I've had way more frustrations driving to the mall, walking to EB and dealing with the people in/around EB than I ever have with steam. It has been as close to perfect as one could expect in my experience.

 

[quadomatic]

Thought of one problem with Steam - prices take a long time to change, and there are no major sales on single titles (they've had great sales on sets...remember the id games pack sale?), and in the field of sale prices, B&M will reign supreme.

 

[nitromullet]

No issues with Steam per se, but NVIDIA driver profiles don't seem to recognize Steam games as installed when using the NVIDIA Control Panel. The profiles do work when you run the game, however. The main annoyance is that when you select "Show only programs found on this computer" in the CP, your Steam games don't show up in the list. Solution: use nHancer.